New focus

Some of you may follow me on facebook and saw my message about blowing our budget last month.  I am a numbers girl and when I sat down to balance everything out I was shocked (and saddened) to see how bad things were.

The month before we had a big financial thing happen.... we paid off our house.  It wasn't something that was easy but had been a goal for us for awhile.  Before I quit working, during that year of 'trying' to see if we could make it on one salary we put my entire paychecks (minus giving) towards our mortgage and quickly whittled it down.  So for a solid year we made probably three extra payments each month.  It made a HUGE difference.  It wasn't easy but our house is OURS now.  It's a good feeling to know that if something would happen to Nathan or our income, we are not threatened with a payment hanging over our heads to keep the house... we should always have a roof over us now.... heating it may be another question. ha

But because of that I knew coming into December that we had some 'extra' wiggle room and didn't pay as close attention as I would have before.  It really wasn't a good idea. I overspent.  I made a mistake.  But I only did it for one month, I've realized it, and now we are re-focusing for the new year.  I honestly believe that every so often making mistakes are good and teachable moments - they help you to refocus and gain new traction in meeting your goals. 

This year our goal is to pay off my student loans. To easily do that we would need to put each mortgage payment towards my loans each month.  I said to 'easily' do that.....  we also have a couple large expenses we are looking at that isn't going to make it easy.  So I'm going to being pinching pennies... planning ahead better, and really watching every dollar that comes in and goes out.  And I hope to blog soon on our budget and how that works in our house.

I hope and plan to blog more intensely on this and how we are doing each month.  What are your goals for the coming year? Do you have big ones or small ones? Having a goal (no matter how big or small) is the first step towards making a change. :)

***My dear friend who tried to contact me in a comment the other day, because my blog is so basic I wasn't notified and not sure you were notified that I responded......  email me at njbish5 @ gmail (dot) com

Some Days

I had a dear friend tell me the other day that what she treasures about me is my honesty.... well girls wait till you read this post. 

Yesterday on Facebook I posted a link to a blog post called - Desperate Housewives–No Laughing Matter: Why Young Mothers Don’t Need God, They Need Help.  It's excellent and I had tears in my eyes while reading it. Even though my blog is supposed to be 'Along the Way to becoming a Proverbs 31 woman' I know that I will NEVER come close to being her. And this post speaks to that directly... that in our culture we are so pressured to be on our own and be responsible for the children we have birthed (I'm not talking about the # of children, just that we had them). There is so little support and encouragement that we often feel very alone during the long days of being home with our babies. 

This is such a brief section of her post but she could have been reading my inner thoughts exactly:

Once a woman with such a tender outlook on marriage and motherhood, of being a willing helpmate for a man and raising up precious babes, slowly over time, warping into an unrecognizable person, inside and out.

Crying.  Weeping.  Yelling.  Throwing things.  Coming closer to beating my children than I ever thought possible.  Sitting on the couch completely numb.  Looking out the window at the woman freely walking her dog outside, my heart lusting after the freedom, of being able to walk, of being able to leave the house without having to find shoes, pack a diaper bag, put on coats, buckle little people into carseats…

Years of living–no–not living–SURVIVING.

And then while conversing with dear friends on fb about this post I got distracted.  About 45 minutes earlier my mom had come over to get something and I thought I heard Naomi wake up from her nap but never came downstairs so I assumed she had fallen back to sleep.  As I was walking out to the garage to get dinner out of the freezer (don't judge), I heard something and immediately my stomach dropped.  This child is like the ones you only read about.... seriously.  I walk upstairs and find her on my dresser covered in lotion and Dr. Scholl's rough heel cream. c.o.v.e.r.e.d. her face, her hair, her clothes, my dresser, everything on my dresser.  She immediately covers her face and starts crying. I didn't even have to say anything - there were no words. It was like looking at those pictures of kids who got into baby powder and decorate the room just pure disbelief.

Let me explain that she was locked in her room for her nap because we've had this issue before when she was supposed to be going to sleep, I thought once she was asleep I was safe to unlock the door. guess not. Again please don't judge... but locking her in her room keeps her safe after some of her prior escapades she's been on while she was supposed to be napping - I think she's part ninja. With having a two story house and two other children I can't exactly sit outside her room for 2 hours while she naps.


While I don't completely agree with her title - I think we still need God because some ok most days He's the only way I get through it. I think it needs to say that we need Godly women to help us, minister to us, guide and teach us.

Times are changing

My little baby Naomi isn't so much a baby anymore... and it happened so fast. She's been keeping us on our toes since she was born. You might remember the sudden and traumatic (for me) end to nursing that happened? Well she's done it again.

Last Thursday night she suddenly became absolutely petrified of her crib.  About 3am she learned how to crawl out of her crib and proceeded to stand in the middle of her room screaming. She wasn't so much crying as much as just screaming.  And if you would attempt to put her back into her crib well she reacted as though the crib was full of venomous snakes.  It was crazy to be honest. For almost 2 years she has been our star sleeper for the most part. Something else was going on but try to tell that to yourself when you're so tired you're crying on Friday morning.

We tried to put her into bed with us at some point on Thursday just so we could get some sleep but you see our children are very well sleep trained in that they have only ever slept in their cribs or beds... never with us. We may occasionally lay down with them in the evening but it's hardly ever until they actually fall asleep.  Which is terrific.... until you need them to sleep with you and then it's just a mess because they don't know how to sleep with you (that's why traveling is soooo hard for us - they only know how to sleep in their own beds by themselves).

So starting out Friday morning I was pretty much dreading the day because 1) I was tired and 2) I had no idea how I was going to get her nap because 1) she hated her crib and 2) she was able to crawl out of it now. 

*Side note this is and was not a disobedience problem - she was honestly terrified of her crib I am very cautious of trying to make sure I don't make excuses for my children but also having grace and understanding when things are just not right and it's definitely not the normal for my child.

She did eventually nap because well she just passed out she was as tired as I.  We were also able to get her to go to sleep in her crib on Friday night until she woke us up at 12:30 when she threw herself out of the crib. Thankfully she did settle back down and sleep with us until about 6 on Saturday when she decided it was time to start the day. *yawn* 

Saturday brought a whole change of plans when we decided it was time to just put the crib away (for awhile anyhow) and bring on the big girl bed.  Knowing the trouble we would probably have getting her used to a new bed we just went straight to a twin bed so that there was room for one of us to sleep with her for awhile.  Now I have absolutely no problem sleeping with my children and can sleep with them pretty darn well.  Nathan - not so much. He truly hasn't had any sleep in almost 4 days.  Things are getting a little cranky around here.

So it's Monday and here I sit in her room as she struggles to settle down and nap on her own. We are not going to because well I just can't get into the habit of laying down with her but knowing new habits take awhile to form we are giving her some grace and staying in the room with her until she's asleep - this was we can also make sure she stays in her bed. She is our climber.

What a whirlwind it's been lately..... but I am super thankful this happened now and not 2 weeks before the baby came, at least it's still manageable and hopefully in 7 months she'll get it out of her system. ha!

A Setback

I posted about my garden here and how excited I was about it.  If you didn't see the pictures be sure to check them out. I was pretty proud of it.

Then last week we got a freak hail storm. This weather has been crazy.  Thursday I was on my way home from bible study and ran into a storm, by time I got home I knew it had been bad.  A tree in our neighbor's yard had been snapped apart.  I didn't even want to see my garden. The next morning I ventured down with much hesitation.

*tear*

My garden was a mess.  The tomatoes were on the ground... entire posts just pushed over - some on my pepper plants and cucumbers.  Random parts of my corn just looked like they were pushed over by a person.  My peas were smashed into the ground, most of the tops off my onions were broke off.  Oh my zucchini plants.... destroyed. Absolutely destroyed, the leaves just ripped to shreds.

It was heartbreaking to be honest. I had invested so much time and energy into this garden.  I just walked away and couldn't bear to even deal with it.

Later that day I got to thinking about how I've been complaining about conveniences and how much are they really a blessing to us.  Well I found out, because my garden was destroyed did not mean our family would starve to death this winter.  We still have the option of going to the grocery store and buying food that will sustain us over the months.

That is a blessing for sure.  Be sure to come back tomorrow to find out what God continued to teach me through out the weekend. :)

Construction Project

Well after a couple of snafu's our construction project finally started yesterday and within hours we had our first major issue - they broke our water line. So now 12 hours later we still don't have water. Thankfully it was mostly while we were sleeping but I had a couple moments of pure meltdown last night. 

I never expected that much dirt to come from the hole.

It's a lot of dirt.

It's everywhere in my yard.

I have no idea what we are going to do with it.

Anyone need some clean fill?

I know no project goes perfectly so I'm not totally surprised.  I just hope this is not how the entire project is going to go - I'm not sure I could handle this much stress every day.  It can only go up hill from here right???? 

Apology

I need to apologize. I got ahead of the game and posted some samples that were 'free'.  Upon some reporting from someone I realized that these companies were asking for way too much information and were just a bigger hassle then what they were worth.

so....

From here on out I am going to have someone (it's a secret) test out the samples/link/sites before I post them to be sure of a couple things:

1) they are legit
2) they are easy
3) they really are free
4) etc... :)
5) but I will make mistake so please be willing to forgive me AND if you come across something that doesn't turn out right please let me know so I can remove it or explain it. 

I have removed the offending links and hope to not have this issue in the future.  This is my fail for the week! :) You have to live and learn that's for sure.  Hope you all understand and stay with me!

Giant Chocolate Chip Cookie!

 My little girl wanted a giant chocolate chip cookie for her birthday!  Easier said then done... hee hee.  My first pan did not turn out so well - sorta looked like cinnamon rolls all smushed together. You can see from the first two pictures how not very pretty they turned out (FAIL #1).

Finished 1st attempt

And because I could not let my little girl have that as a birthday 'cake' I gave it another shot. This time I flattened all the cookies and made sure the edges were all touching each other.  Of course I forgot to take a picture (FAIL #2) because I was running behind since we had to make two different ones.  My niece helped decorate the final product and it was a huge hit with everyone!

You put chocolate icing and M&M's on pretty much anything and it will be a hit!

Plus I'm sure we saved quite a bit of money by making this ourselves (I had gotten an awesome deal on the preportioned cookie dough last week), the kids had a blast decorating, and it was one of a kind!

Linked to:
Tasty Tuesday

Lesson Learned

**Update - my order was canceled and I received absolutely no notification.  I am disappointed in the way Woman Within handled this fiasco.  I will think twice before ordering from them again.

I stumbled upon a great deal yesterday - A $50/$50 purchase from Woman Within. I almost posted it to my blog immediately but was in too big of a hurry to place my order that I couldn't do two things at once.

From the time I found the deal, placed my order and found out it wasn't working for everyone was less than 10 minutes. God was good in protecting me from posting something that wasn't accurate. He was also good in letting my order go through!

From what I can tell the deal was so hot that Woman Within changed the coupon code to $20/$50 purchase. Some ladies had their orders changed mid-checkout. So far my order is in process and should be shipped soon. I haven't heard that it's going to be canceled so my hopes are still up that I'll get my order. (Once I receive it I'll post the order!)

I need to be sure to remember that I can not be in a huge hurry and post everything I find without researching it a bit more. I don't want any of my readers to get 'burned' by something that I posted.

This could have ended up being a disaster but thankfully God was looking out for all of us.

Home-made English Muffins

I love to entertain family and friends in my home.  I love to try new things.  I love to experiments on my guests.  ha! I love to save money. and... I will admit when I fail.

My wonderful B-I-L and S-I-L were up a couple weekends ago and we had the honor of having them stay at our house.  Of course this gave me the perfect excuse to try something new - Home-made English Muffins.  I was so excited I talked them up all day on Saturday (should have know better). 

I failed - TWICE.  I woke up on-time to start the batter, but my yeast was at my mom's (next-door) and I didn't have the heart to wake them up early.  By time I did get the yeast I was already running behind and didn't leave it sit long enough to raise.   I also didn't have tart rings so the muffins were free-form.  They ended up flat and very odd shaped.  My gracious guests ate them and seemed to enjoy them.   *I did not take any pictures - way too embarrassing*

BUT I could not leave it at that.  So after church I went right back to the recipe and tried it again.  I did things correctly this time by leaving the batter raise for the right amount of time.  I also found some metal heart cookie cutters that I thought would work in a pinch and I used wide-mouth canning rings.  ha! 

Well they would have worked except I didn't realize how much they were going to raise.  So when I flipped them over (easier said then done) the extra batter just oozed everywhere! The following pictures tell the story nicely.  Please don't laugh too hard.... :)

They do look beautiful if you ignore the 'extra' batter.  Oh they were so good the next day toasted and covered in butter and jam. Yum.

As they always say - 3rd time's a charm.  Who's coming next to stay at my house?


Linked to - Friday Fails at myblessedlife.net
Linked to - Frugal Fridays at LifeasMOM.com